First Birthday!

Birthday hat for the birthday boy

Uncle Dustin, Aunt Sarah, and cousin Colin

Bobo and Jocy

April and Nathan

Aunt Sarah and Aunt Beka

Mommy is about to get messy!

Yea! I'm the birthday boy!

Yum! Yum!

Can I take my hat off now?!?!

Mommy made my birthday hat

Baby's First Christmas!

Getting the hang of opening presents with Papa

Case in point, whole pile of presents behind him - but more interested in the dog bone!

Opening presents with daddy!

Christmas morning

Found his animal crackers in his stocking!

Merry Christmas! So, Jonas had no idea what was going on Christmas morning. When we sat him down in front of the tree with presents, stockings, and some unwrapped toys his little face lit up! It was so cute! He started laughing. After the initial excitement he opened his stocking and dug into his animal crackers - I think that was one of the highlights of the morning for him. He liked ripping paper off of presents alright but didn't quite have the focus to unwrap a whole present without some help from mom and dad. After a while, he got tired of presents and all he could think about was getting Bailey's Christmas bone away from him...
But after we were finished with presents and cleaned up we headed off to Waffle House (a tradition we started last year...a good pregnant tradition) where Jonas ate his weight in grits (a Southern boy for sure!). Overall, we had a great day! We hung out with family, ate Papa's famous chili (well, it's famous to us), watched a movie (or 2), and played some Rock Band! A Christmas to remember! Oh, yea, and baby sister even got presents and a stocking!

Not today!

In my classroom, I have a special needs friend who often repeats things that I say. Every morning we play a hangman type game to see who will be our special helper for the day. I hold up alphabet cards with the letter and picture (like n for noodle). After holding up a card I will say, "Does our special helper have a "n" for noodle in their name? If not, apparently, I will often say, "Not today!" Now when I ask my special friend to do something he doesn't want to do he will say, "No thank you! Not today!" Hmm...
I am often reminded of this phrase when I think I am going to get a task completed at home...and for whatever reason...pregnant, 11 and a half month old, or any other circumstance...it just doesn't happen. One task I have been trying to complete for a while now is taking a Christmas card worthy picture of Jonas. Well, I am happy to say that, after several days of trying and me ending up saying "not today!" that we finally have a picture! The cards have been ordered and now we will have to wait until they come in the mail and then scurry around gathering addresses to get them in the mail...hopefully no one out there is holding their breath. Here are a couple of the pictures entitled "Not today!"

O Christmas Tree! O Christmas Tree!

The lil' fam setting up the tree together!

Bling for the tree and some bling for me!Our newest ornament!

We finally got our Christmas tree today and Beka was nice enough to come over and help decorate it! So far Jonas is pulling the shatter-proof ornaments off the lower part of the tree. Hopefully, we won't have too many ornament casualties this year. It is going to be interesting trying to keep him from pulling the lights off the tree. I think we can forget about putting any presents under the tree until Christmas morning. We are so excited about celebrating Christmas with Jonas this year! Thinking, planning, and executing new traditions we want to have as a family has been really fun.

Christmas Edition - getting to know me

1. Wrapping paper or gift bags? I love wrapping presents with beautiful bows and paper...but sometimes a gift bag works better

2. Real tree or Artificial? REAL!!!

3. When do you put up the tree? Usually the weekend right after Thanksgiving...this year...pregnant, sick, and an 11 month old, working full-time - I think my sister said she would come help next weekend. Otherwise, who knows.

4. When do you take the tree down? Usually New Years Day

5. Do you like eggnog? Yes -but the friend who sent this to me informed me of the tons of calories in it and said something about soy eggnog - might have to try that!

6. Favorite gift received as a child? "My Child" doll - it looked just like me (or so I thought)

7. Hardest person to buy for? my dad or Mal's dad...it's a toss up.

8. Easiest person to buy for? Jonas

9. Do you have a nativity scene? No. But I really want one...still looking for just the right one and a place to put it in our tiny little house. Not a whole lot of table space - especially with an 11 month old climbing up and pulling anything within reach on the floor.

10. Mail or email Christmas cards? I love sending cards in the mail (hopefully I will get to that this year) and displaying the ones we have received!

11. Worst Christmas gift you ever received? That would be the Red Lobster biscuits my grandmother wrapped up all greasy and put under the Christmas tree! Bless her heart she knew how much I loved them...

12. Favorite Christmas Movie? I have sort of gotten burnt out on Christmas movies that I used to love (all the old ones)...I am now looking for new Christmas movies to watch - I would like to see Family Man this year and I was watching a few minutes of Elf earlier.

13. When do you start shopping for Christmas? Usually in November sometime.

14. Have you ever recycled a Christmas present? No way! Who does that?!? Ok maybe I have...but I'll never tell.

15. Favorite thing to eat at Christmas? pies, cookies, white trash, anything sweet...then all the traditional stuff too!

16. Lights on the tree? yes. we have these pretty pearl ones

17. Favorite Christmas songs: All the hymns - and the fun old ones.

18. Travel at Christmas or stay home? Used to travel before kids - now we stay home...it is so relaxing!

19. Can you name all of Santa's reindeer's? Rudolph, Donner, Blitzen, Prancer, and Dancer, Cupid...hmmm....

20. Angel on the tree top or a star? Star

21. Open the presents Christmas Eve or morning? One present on Christmas Eve (new pj's to wear to bed and wake up in on Christmas morning). The rest of the presents on Christmas morning - stockings first!

22. Most annoying thing about this time of the year? Emphasis on "making ALL your Christmas wishes come true!" with a mountain of credit card debt - what about Jesus' birth and the FREE gift of salvation!?!?

23. Favorite ornament theme or color? Favorite ornament - Mal and my first Christmas together we got an ornament with our initials on it and the date - this year we will get one for Jonas' first Christmas! (Probably a new favorite!) Our color theme used to be bright red and silver for about 4 years...then a couple of years ago I changed to green, pearl (ivory), and gold.

24. Favorite for Christmas dinner? Broccoli casserole, sweet potatoes (with pecans and brown sugar), stuffing...the list goes on and on.

25. What do you want for Christmas this year? a housekeeper would be great! Oh, and great big, huge bathtowels (something that will actually wrap around my body) and our driveway widened, and for Jonas to say "Mama".